Gumshoe Ghost Mystery: Dying for the Past Part 33

Agent Dobron nodded. "Right. I get you. And I want to find two missing Federal witnesses. Okay, we'll leave you out of the politics. But I need you to trust me."

Bear didn't answer.

"I can prove my men are solid. First, tomorrow morning, we have to go see Angela Tucker. It's urgent."

"Why?" I asked.

Bear asked the same thing, adding, "She's going to see Francesca Ma.s.seria-she-"

"Ma.s.seria?" Agent Dobron's voice grew loud. "How does she know Frannie Ma.s.seria?"

"Angela met with her when Frannie sold the Vincent House to Angela's historical foundation. She also bought a lot of old family heirlooms for the museum."

"So you two think Frannie Ma.s.seria may have this mysterious book." Agent Dobron smiled a strange, thin smile. "She's wasting her time. Stephanos Grecco found it and stashed it somewhere. Bonnie Grecco is the key, not Frannie Ma.s.seria. Tell her I want to see her at your office in the morning. Forget going to Charlottesville."

"Why?" Bear asked.

"I have some questions about Andre Cartier I want answered."

I said, "Remember, Bear, we saw him at Vincent's last night and he went straight home. Angel hasn't heard from him since."

"Cartier?" Bear said. "What's wrong now?"

"That's what I want to find out." Agent Dobron started down the Mall, saying over his shoulder, "My boys were waiting for him at his place in DC last night. He never showed up. Cartier's missing, too."

fifty-five.

Chevy leaned back from the window overlooking the two men talking below him. He watched the arrogant FBI Agent walk away and leave Detective Braddock standing alone talking to himself-something he noticed Braddock do a lot. And if what he'd heard in his voice recorder wasn't his imagination, Braddock wasn't talking to himself at all. Chevy went to the other side of the room-the same room Detective Braddock used to watch for him earlier-and waited for his cell phone to buzz.

He didn't have to wait long.

"Yeah, yeah, it went as planned. You ready to pay me for this other thing?"

The voice on the other end was cryptic and out of breath.

"All right. You better not be lying to me. And the price just went up. It's gonna cost you ten-large."

The voice hesitated and grew excited.

"Easy. Everybody in town is all jacked up over this book. Somebody will pay. I just heard the lady professor is going after it tomorrow morning. Some old broad named Francesca something. Professor Tucker thinks she has it."

The voice slow-interested but cautious.

"No way, man. Ten-large if you want a copy. Twenty if you want the original with no copies made. But when you pay me, we meet face-to-face. None of this cloak and dagger c.r.a.p. You know? I gotta protect myself."

Silence. An answer.

"Okay, I'll let you know if she finds it. Then, after I grab it, you gotta give me my money-face to face. If not, I sell to the highest bidder. Comprende?"

fifty-six.

"A remote control toy helicopter?" Angel turned off the county road and headed deeper into the Virginia countryside. "And what about Chevy?"

"He disappeared. Dobron charged in and screwed everything up. The helicopter went one way, Chevy the other."

Angel and I had been driving to Frannie Ma.s.seria's retirement home since eight this morning. Part of the way, she'd had a blistering argument with W. Simon Hahn-"W" for pain-in-the-a.s.s or whatever "w" word fit. He'd called at eight-thirty to grill her about Andre and Poor Nic again. Even threatening to send Bear to see him didn't stop him this time. Angel hung up on him in mid-threat.

"Angel," I asked, "I've been wondering about Simon. What is the 'W' for anyway?"

"Wilhelm," she said. "His family escaped from Germany in the earlier years of the war. When he got older, he dropped the name to just a 'W.'"

"Wilhelm?" Interesting. Wilhelm Simon Hahn. A very German name. Very German as in n.a.z.i spy rings, SS troopers, and the Russian Front. I suggested as much to Angel.

"Tuck, you're getting carried away with this spy story. Not everyone is a Russian or n.a.z.i spy."

"How do you know? Maybe they're good spies." When she rolled her eyes, I changed the subject and filled her in on the remainder of my exciting night chasing radio-controlled helicopters around Old Town. It would have been funnier if Bear had captured Chevy and retrieved the flash drive of evidence from the Vincent House.

As it stands, no one was laughing.

"And the flash drive?"

"Gone." I sat beside her in the front seat. Hercule was dozing in the back. On long trips, he only woke up when we stopped for coffee and yet another breakfast sandwich-to-go for him. "The helicopter flew over Old Town and landed in an old pickup truck heading out of town. Bear's men chased it for two miles before they got him. It turns out the guy had no idea what was going on. He was some drunk leaving the bars. They found the helicopter but the flash drive was gone."

Angel consulted her GPS "Another mile." Then she nailed it. "Whoever was at the controls was probably on the roof above the square. He flew the helicopter over the roof, grabbed the flash drive, and sent the helicopter to the first vehicle he saw. He knew Bear would be chasing the helicopter. He slipped away."

would have been out of a job. "My tutoring has paid off."

"We're here," she said, turning into a long drive past a sign that read, "Saint Vincent's Retirement Estates"

"St. Vincent? You gotta be kidding me."

She nodded. "Frannie built it with Vincent Calaprese's money when she was a younger woman. When she got older, she left the Vincent House and moved in here. No one ever knew why she didn't just stay there."

I did. "Maybe she didn't like daddy or his mistress hanging around all these years."

Ahead of us a grand estate rose up from the Charlottesville countryside. It reminded me of a Tuscan villa. Of course, I'd ever been to Tuscany, but if I had, this is how it would look. The estate was huge-a two-story stone faade with a clay-tiled roof. There was a portico entrance with tall, stalwart stone columns. On either side of the portico were twin loggias framing the entire villa-perhaps two hundred feet or more across. The entrance drive circled-you guessed it-a story-high marble fountain. The s.e.xy, naked maiden showered water from her bucket over equally naked and s.e.xy cherubs bathing at her feet. They frolicked in the foundation waiting for manly men to arrive and seduce them.

Well, that's what I saw.

Angel pulled around the circle to a visitor's parking s.p.a.ce and parked. She climbed out of the Explorer, bade Hercule wait behind, and headed for the front portico.

"All right, Angel," I said, falling in behind her. "You do all the talking and I'll do all the snooping."

She rolled her eyes. "I have the same plan."

Inside, we went to a large reception desk more resembling a luxury hotel reception than an old gangster's retirement home. The young man behind the marble counter was dressed in a light colored, double-breasted linen suit from Bogart's closet in Casablanca.

"Yes, ma'am? May I help you?" His nametag read "Robert."

"Good morning." Angel flashed her best smile. "I'm here to see Francesca-"

"Ma.s.seria," Robert said turning to his computer screen below the counter top. "My, my, she is a popular girl this weekend. You're her third guest since Friday night."

"Who else has been here?" Angel asked. "I didn't think Frannie got a lot of visitors."

"She doesn't." Robert looked up from the monitor. "This weekend though, she's quite the belle of the ball."

I said, "Who else?" and Angel asked him again.

"I'm sorry, miss, miss-"

"Professor Angela Tucker. I've been to see her before, Robert. Don't you recall?"

Robert forged a fake smile and returned to his computer. "Oh, yes, Professor. I do recall after all. You're from the University something-or-other. Wonderful you could visit Frannie again. She was very pleased after your visit last month."

"And?"

"And? No, I'm sorry, I am not allowed to disclose a resident's personal information; including their visitors and family details."

Angel smiled. "Of course. Then, may we see her? It's villa G-10. Right? Around back beyond the gardens in the corner?"

I said, "Villa? She has a villa?"

"Yes ... we?" Robert looked at the front entrance. "Is there another guest with you? I'll have to sign them in."

"No, no. I left my Labrador in the car. May I bring him in?"

Robert patted the air. "No pets, I'm sorry. If Frannie is up for a walk or a visit outside, I might let you sneak him in for a visit. But only if she requests. I'll have one of the staff escort you. It will be just a few moments."

"I'll meet you there, Angel," I said. "I'll see if Frannie is in the mood for a stroll. Hercule needs to take a walk after his last egg sandwich."

She nodded and went to a nearby lounge area to wait on her escort.

I headed for Frannie's villa.

_____.

Frannie was not in the mood for a stroll through the gardens. In fact, Frannie was not in the mood for any more visitors this weekend either.

Frannie was dead.

I found her in the small, white stone villa-more a bungalow if you ask me-on the far side of the rear gardens. She was lying face-up on her living room couch as though she were napping. But the throw pillow beside her head was still damp from saliva and sweat. And in the center of its flowered print was an almost unnoticeable drop of blood.

"Sorry, Frannie, you didn't deserve this."

I leaned down to examine her body, looking for a tiny tear in her frenulum caused by her struggle beneath the pillow. It was there, along with a thin smear of blood on her gums. As I looked around, a door closed in the back of the house and I went to investigate. When I reached the bedroom doorway, I would have had a heart attack if I weren't already dead.

Kneeling down at Frannie's bedroom nightstand, rifling through her drawers, was Andre Cartier.

"Andre, what are you doing here?" I went inside. "Tell me you didn't kill the old lady. Please. Tell me-"

Andre jumped up and closed the nightstand drawer. He went around the bed with frustration drawing his face tighter. He muttered something as his eyes narrowed and darted around the room.

"d.a.m.n you, Andre, what have you done?"

He jerked open the other nightstand drawer and pulled out its contents-a few magazines, pens, pencils, a small flashlight, and an old, worn Bible. He tossed each of the items on the bed and took the drawer all the way out of the stand, flipped it around, and examined underneath.

Nothing.

He began stuffing the drawer's contents back inside when he picked up the Bible. The cover was loose and the book slipped out of it onto the floor. When he bent down to retrieve it, he froze.

So did I.

He held the Bible cover in his hand. The book at his feet had its own cover-a worn, tattered, black leather one. It bore no markings or t.i.tles. He picked it up and fanned it. It was three inches thick and its pages were matted and frayed. He opened it somewhere in the middle and his eyes exploded; he smiled.

"Did you find it, Andre?" I said, moving around to peek over his shoulder. "Vincent's book?"

His eyes ran over the hand-scribed pages; a line here, a line there. With each page, his face lightened until it was about to burst into giddy laughter.

Vincent Calaprese's mob journal.

"Dear G.o.d, you weren't lying." He placed the book on the bed and returned the journal into the Bible book cover and tucked it into his waistband under his s.h.i.+rt. Then, he straightened the room, erasing the telltale signs of his presence-disheveled bed linens, dresser drawers still cracked open, items on the bed.

"Andre, nothing is worth killing over. This is gonna break Angel's heart. And she's here."

Something called me from Frannie's dressing table across the room. There were dozens of framed photographs lined up in front of the mirror-a collage of memories spanning her life. One photograph captured my attention.

It was a five-by-seven, black-and-white print of a beautiful, young Francesca Calaprese-I recognized her from the portrait hanging in the Vincent House. She was sitting on a porch swing with a das.h.i.+ng young man in an Army uniform. I guessed it was during the war-World War II-and the two appeared to be in their twenties. She was lying against his shoulder with an adoring smile. His arm was around her shoulders as he kissed the top of her head.

They were in love.

There was something about the photograph. It gripped me and pulled me closer. Something strange and familiar-personal to me-caressed my thoughts and beckoned me to remember a memory I never had.

I reached out and touched the frame.

The room exploded in a shower of light and darkness.